Hello and welcome to the history page. Our topic of discussion this week
centres on the penury and scarcity that characterized the Pitiuses,
especially Formentera, during the final years of the Civil War. However,
before going on to examine this particular state of affairs, it may be
helpful to summarize what we have learned so far in our chronicles. For,
despite a certain long-windedness on my part, the plotline boils down to
two basic coordinates: the voluntary withdrawal of Republican troops
after five unsuccessful weeks of occupation, and the incorporation of
Ibiza and Formentera into Franco’s domain on 20th September
1936, a mere two months after the outbreak of war. It is safe to say
that, as of this date, the islands! receded once again into the
periphery of events, where they remained for the long, painful
denouement of war. As we shall see, the removal of military action from
Pitiusan shores did not lessen by one iota the hardship of life during
the three lean years that lay ahead.
Having concerned ourselves primarily with the course of political and
military developments in our previous instalments, we will now go on to
explore the common man’s experience of wartime society. Perhaps even
more acutely than in mainland Spain, the sea-bound isolation of Ibiza
and Formentera resulted in conditions of extreme lack. Fuel was scarce,
food was even scarcer and the circulation of currency ground to a
virtual halt. In short, the standard of island living quickly devolved
to subsistence level, and government hand-outs became the only means of
survival for large sectors of the population.
Wartime Welfare
Franco’s ‘New State’, instituted in all National territories well before
the close of the war, struggled to bring its pre-war ideologies in line
with the desperate needs of a stricken population. To this end, a host
of welfare measures were introduced, all promoted with the
propagandistic verve of Big Brother and all appealing to the patriotic,
Christian vein that ran so deeply through the bedrock of Spanish
society. These measures most commonly took the form of required
donations, ‘required’ in the sense that those citizens who were able to
contribute but did not were publicly black-listed in the local
newspapers. This tactic proved to be an effective deterrent to
half-hearted participation in the continual charity rounds that were
taken up by the female chapters of the Falangist-Traditionalist party.
To name but a few of the funds that were set up, we can cite the ‘Day of
the Combatant’, donations for which were collected monthly; ‘Aid to
Liberated Populations’ and the ‘Day of the Single Plate’ (a reference to
the fact that families were expected to eat just one course for their
dinner instead of the traditional two so that the savings could then be
donated to the fund), contributions for which were collected on a
fortnightly basis; and lastly, the ‘Day without Dessert’ fund, donations
for which were collected every Monday.
With
the monies generated from these charity drives, public soup-kitchens
were set up in National territories all over Spain in order to alleviate
wide-spread hunger as well as the diseases linked to malnutrition. It
was not until 23rd May 1938, however, that ‘Social Aid’ the
coordinating entity for these eateries, was finally established in
Ibiza, its headquarters located in carrer Amadeu in Dalt Vila.
The following month of June the same service was also set up in
Formentera.
Employment and Commerce
As
would be expected, all labour unions established prior to or during the
Second Republic were outlawed. In their place arose the Vertical Union
in 1938, a labour organization that closely monitored all business
enterprises and predetermined the guidelines by which businesses would
henceforth be run. One of the new norms stipulated that all companies
were legally bound to provide National veterans with a job once the war
was over. This measure did much to inspire loyalty among Franco’s ranks
as well as insuring the introduction of regime-friendly workers in the
mainstream of the Spanish labour force.
As
specifically regards Ibiza and Formentera, their geographic removal from
mainland supply lines caused shortages in a number of staple goods and
products, a circumstance which inevitably drove up their price. As a
precaution against smuggling and the unchecked growth of the black
market, the Insular Board of Provisions required all businesses to
submit a report on the exact nature and quantity of the goods they had
in stock. The authorities then fixed the price for all manufactures and
raw materials as well as regulating the business hours during which
these things could be sold to the public. Under special scrutiny were
bread ovens in an attempt to guard against extra loaves being baked and
sold surreptitiously at a higher price than that established by the
Provisions Board.
Despite these regulations, in actual fact, many products were stockpiled
and then sold at a gross profit, often with the tacit consent of the
very authorities responsible for preventing the proliferation of black
trade. The goods that most naturally lent themselves to such illegal
trading were tobacco, oil, alcohol and timber. As Artur Parron explains,
“The smuggling of these products was carried out by a broad spectrum
of islanders, from fishermen and farmers trying to make some extra
income to wealthy merchants in search of higher profits, from
bureaucrats and civil guards to the middlemen that connected the various
parties. Even though smuggling had existed before the war, this activity
was now powerfully fuelled by the extreme scarcity of goods and the
desire for riches by many merchants operating in the shadow of
corruption cast by the authorities themselves.”
Meagre Solidarity
Throughout the whole of 1937 the economic situation in the Pitiuses was
nothing short of precarious. When, in April of the same year, the
governor of the Balearic Islands, Mateu Torres i Bestard, visited the
islands, he was met by a bleak picture of misery and want. Moved by what
he saw, the governor returned to Majorca with a plea of solidarity that
his fellow Majorcans might provide some measure of economic aid to their
island brethren. Sadly, his exhortation was largely unsuccessful.
Somewhat ironically, however, the following year the none-too-rich
Ibicencos took it upon themselves to pool their limited resources in a
campaign aimed at alleviating the grave shortages that afflicted their
neighbours in Formentera. The habitual hardship of life on the smaller
Pitiusa had by this time (1938) plummeted to intolerable levels, owing
above all to the severe lack of manpower and the subsequent inability of
the remaining men and women to work the land to fruitful yield. Readers
will remember that Formentera, had been a seat of leftist support so
that, under National rule, large swathes of the able-bodied population
had either fled or been imprisoned.
Closing
On
that bittersweet note we shall leave off for this week. Join us next
time as we press on toward the end of the war and the gradual
restoration of normalcy on the islands. Until then, |